I am awake, I am alive, and only one thought is resonating through my head this morning …

Feel sad first.

As non-Indigenous across the country post wildly on social media, proclaiming their disgust over the Kamloops reveal of tragedies long documented, I cannot help but think “Not yet”.

Anger is easy. Anger is leap-frogging over what we truly need from you. We need you to feel the pain, the sadness, because anger ends. In a week you will be on to something else but grieving takes time. Indigenous people have been grieving for many, many decades.

So please do me a favour – resist. Don’t demand retribution of the politicians you elected, the ones who talk a good game (when backed into a corner) but do little else. Don’t point fingers when every non-Indigenous (and many Indigenous) have benefited from the systems that attempted to destroy our families, communities, and children.

Instead, just stop and feel this pain. Carry the weight of this country’s Creation story. Sit in it, without excuse or deflection to another. Cry the tears.

It is not up to you to decide what comes next, what needs to be done for our people. Now, all is needed is for you to hold space, quietly, sit there beside us. Feel free to cry.

Because anger heals nothing, tears do. And we need this healing. The families need this.

Thank you.
 

I love you!
HUGSSSSSSSSSSSSS
Sandi

#ibelieveinyou #ibelieveinme #icreatesafespace #repairingfeathers #icreatespace #celebrateandsurvive